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The voice of Cities

OASC’s view

Intro

She’s Vice-President of Open & Agile Smart Cities (OASC), as well as a Professor at the Maia University Institute and Responsible for International Relations at the Brazilian Network of Intelligent and Human Cities. Margarida could easily be dubbed "Smart City", but she was given another surname. We are talking about Margarida Campolargo.

It was with a focus on smart cities that we invited her to sit down and have a conversation.

"Our comfortable couch was the stage where Margarida told us about herself, smart cities, challenges she has faced and the future."

’’the goal is always to increase the quality of life of citizens’’

Smart City Concept

We started by talking about OASC. A network which aims to give cities a voice, helping in making decisions and implementations, with the goal of creating a digital single market.

For this, they have several stages of development, such as working groups, execution of projects with the support of European funds, organization of events (such as conferences and workshops) and partnerships with companies and public-private entities.

In Margarida's point of view, the concept of a smart city is not consensual and, therefore, working with cities in the exchange of knowledge makes cities learn more about the term. The different dynamics introduced by cities contribute to what one thinks about when talking about smart cities: improving people's quality of life.

"Although there are different challenges, depending on the characteristics of each city, the goal is always to increase the quality of life of citizens."

And so, even though different places, cultures and geographies, condition the way of living and empowering technology, there are common denominators. Margarida Campolargo explains that while we all have a notion of what technology is, many do not know its true potential, which conditions us when developing adapted solutions. Therefore, the future is to increase knowledge, training and strategy, based on the real needs of cities and, consequently, the people who inhabit it.

And the future, in Margarida’s point of view, is only one: to be able to respond to the needs of the Human Being and to have the citizen at the center of the process.